Random Thoughts from a Restless Mind

Sunday musings…

1) Hope. Hope, alone, is no strategy for success.

2) Mofongo. No adventure is quite complete unless a new nickname is included in the outcome. Indeed, the better the nickname, the better the adventure.

Introducing Mama Mofongo, the 85ish yo star of our adventure in Puerto Rico.

3) Rome. You know, ‘when in Rome’ and all that. There’s a little more meat on that bone, though, especially if you are an outsider or an outlier. A certain respect for, and at least an attempt at following the norms of a place is a part of the equation.

We may talk the talk about being a good guest, whatever that might mean. In a foreign land we might try to at least avoid the specter of “The Ugly American”. One can, and probably should, have at least a bit of situational awareness of the local norms even in a place that is as seemingly familiar as a CrossFit Box you are visiting or your original home town.

My brother-in-law and I visited the neighborhood bar where we’d each been first served at age 1* (our kids read this). It was as if we’d been there last week, but it was also very much a place where we were visiting. We stopped, looked around, took the place’s pulse, took our own, then settled in. Everyone saw us for a bit, but soon we were just part of the place.

A couple of beers later we left to a nod and a smile from the owner, tiny gestures of thanks for paying our respects.

4) GAS. I would like to introduce a new entity. Think of it as a kind of energy, psychic fuel maybe. It’s quantifiable, and in my experience it’s both finite and capable of replenishment. When your tank is full you are fully engaged, committed. When you’re out of GAS almost nothing short of conscription can move you.

GAS, you see, stands for “Give A Sh!t”.

Yup, when you’ve got GAS stuff happens. It’s another way of saying that you care, but there’s a bit more there. GAS implies fuel. We’re gonna move. Something’s gonna happen, or NOT happen because we have the GAS to stop it. You’re gonna make a difference because you’ve got the GAS to do it.

Hope by itself is a weak strategy. but hope fueled by someone with GAS…that’s where magic can happen.

I’ll see you next week…

1) Fear. “I used to fear the workouts…” Playoff Beard. Perspicacious previous post from PB.

This is important in light of CrossFit’s epic success w/ the Games, culminating in 12, I think, 30:00 segments showing on ESPN2. Many will come to CF based on viewing The Games on The Deuce, but many more will react with nothing but fear.

Opportunity knocks. Read through PB’s post to the part about “I realized that I’m competing only with myself” to find the answer to all of those folks who will respond “I could never do that” and remind them that these were a few hundred among hundreds of thousands doing CrossFit.

Universally scaleable. You vs. You. Brought to you courtesy of Playoff Beard.

2) Hard answers. A little help? Sometimes the answer is “no”. Can you help a little bit, here? Every now and again the most honest answer is “no, I can’t”.

These should be rare occurrences, to be sure, but they should be acceptable answers if honestly offered. Indeed, accepting “no” as an answer when we ask for help is sometimes an even greater demonstration of our regard, respect and affection for someone than the consideration given to us if they’d said “yes.”

Sometimes the only honest answer is “no.”

3) Resolve. I landed on “Cool Hand Luke” while surfing yesterday. Man, was Paul Newman something, or what? For all of his faults, and despite being guilty of whatever landed him in that prison camp, Luke was resolved to fight the injustice of his existence. He was resolved not to lose the essence of who he was, despite the hardships imposed on him by those who would break him, break his will, make him relinquish that which made him, well, cool.

Movies are usually an escape for me. I’m not often prompted to terribly deep thought while watching. But I wondered, what of my life that occasionally seems so hard, is actually hard enough that I must bend from a true course? And if it is, indeed, that hard, how long could I hold out against the constancy of the difficulty, like Luke, before I broke?

Luke, knowing that he may finally be broken, seeks answers in the church he forswore. He stands in a doorway. “What we have here is a failure to communicate”. A last act of defiance, or a capitulation? One is left to wonder: did He answer?

4) Charity. I would be remiss is I did not mention the incredible generosity of the CrossFit community in general, and in particular yesterday’s epic Fight Gone Bad series of benefits that have thus far raised >$2MM. We are a generous lot, no matter what detractors may say. It stems from a deeply ingrained generosity on the part of the founders of CrossFit, and this permeates our extended family.

How do you choose your charitable contributions? You know…to whom you will say “yes” and give a donation? We give this conscious thought chez bingo, but it’s not necessary to do so, not necessary to have a charitable plan in order to be charitable (if that makes some sense).

No plan chez you? I like this if that’s the case: the Kismet or Karma of the “run-in” (phrase courtesy of Brad Pitt). When asked how he chose the various and sundry causes that he and his family support Pitt disavowed any plan whatsoever, instead admitting that he supported the needy who he “ran into”. Kismet, some karmic thread, brings one into contact with some someone or some something where you have the opportunity and the ability to effect something positive by answering “yes’.

No charitable plan? No worries. You’ll “run-into” something sooner or later.

I’ll see you next week…

Posted by bingo at September 18, 2011 11:50 AM